EDITORIAL: Regulatory proposal is unfeasible

June 25, 1999
by ANDREA GARBARINO, CEO of Massmedia Part

The proposal by Greenpeace UK executive director Peter Melchett
that the Neill Committee extends the regulatory net to cover not only
formal meetings but also informal contact between lobbyists and MPs is
regulatory fever taken to a ludicrous extreme. No doubt many NGOs feel
they have a raw deal in comparison to agency and in-house lobbyists, and
certainly any regulation would need to address the interest of charities
and pressure groups, but this particular proposal is both unnecessary
and unworkable.